


eventual memory

by cptsuke



Category: Animal Kingdom (TV)
Genre: Gen, M/M, Post-Finale, Unreliable Narrator
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-27
Updated: 2019-08-27
Packaged: 2020-09-28 04:10:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,097
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20419685
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cptsuke/pseuds/cptsuke
Summary: in the end deran's alone, just like he choseintrospection post finale from most unreliable narrator, with a little bit of remember when i killed that guy





	eventual memory

  


He didn't feel the need to wash his hands. He thinks he should have. He waited for the impulse to come. Waited for something – anything – to come now he'd crossed that final line he always swore he wouldn't.

Pope said it was the adrenaline, that he'd come down and start feeling. But the off duty cop he'd accidentally killed – several years past now, when J had first appeared – made him feel something. The moment Baz grabbed the wheel, swerved the SUV across to wipe the guy off against the dumpster. Deran's blood had been singing with adrenaline, and he'd felt the sharp pain of fear (scared, scared, scared) but the need to keep going, everyone relying on him to get them out of there had kept him steady. But when he'd crashed, when it was all over all that had been left was dawning horror, because he did that. No matter how he tried to justify it, no matter how much it swore up and down there should've been no guards there, it didn't matter because a man had died by his hand.

Mostly, now, if he was to think about it, if he actually let himself think about it, he feels a weird sort of blank disappointment; that he'd done it, that his hand had been forced, that Colby had never taken him seriously and this is where it had all led.

He doesn't know what that means. That he could do that. Just because he loved someone. Not in the heat of the moment, not with hot blood and no time to think; Colby had opened his mouth and Deran hadn't even thought of any other solution, he hadn't been able to think of any other way to shut him up. To make him never say those sort of words where anyone could hear.

Now at the end, and it is the end one way or another, Deran doesn't want to feel anything. He's always been too much. Always been too wild, too dangerous, too intense. And even when he means well, well, here they are. His love becomes a thing, a thing that pushes Adrian into drug smuggling instead of talking to him, his very proximity has Adrian staring down fifteen years, and Deran doesn't know how to fix that.

He still doesn’t know if he did the right thing. Not going. Making Adrian leave without him.

It hurts, it feels like there’s a bullet constantly digging in, shifting against bone and sinew, but that doesn’t narrow down whether the decision he made was right.

Sometimes he finds himself thinking, daydreaming, if he just does this, if he just gets through this, if he can just keep breathing then he can go.

Then he remembers, it's not want that keeps him away.

He still doesn’t know what he did wrong. But he knows he did wrong. Somewhere he fucked up. And it’s not hard to imagine. Deran Cody is a black hole, sure he loves but it’s a hungry selfish thing. Even when he thinks he’s doing right, he drives the only man hes ever loved into drug smuggling just to feel like Deran's not controlling every aspect of his life.

If he runs now, if he leaves, he’s been spoiled now, he can’t think of being with Adrian and not living in the same house, sleeping in the same bed, being in his space – their space - and then they'll just start the whole cycle again and soon there'll be no where left to run. It’ll just be them, Adrian's bitter love and Deran's rotten heart.

He can’t fix anything. He tries to be grateful for what he got. Thinks sometimes, when it’s not a knife in his guts, he ought to be thankful for Adrian's last words. A better goodbye than he deserved. A gift that killed all hope of reunion. No matter how much he thinks maybe once things are settled, _maybe_, when they’re not fighting every second day to keep what they’ve always had.

But he's not sure there's an end to this, and if there is, can he weigh his want against _you're the worst thing that ever happened to me._

So he stays. Breathes and fights when he's called for whatever's at stake. Name. Reputation. He tries to care, does in the sense that his brothers care so he does what he has to, ices his knuckles every night and bloodies them all over again the next day

It brings him a weird kind of zen, not like the low level buzz of numbness that had plagued him when Baz was killed, when Pope and Craig were AWOL in a way they’d never been to Deran before. No, this makes him feel useful, like he can do something right, he’s not happy but the concepts become so foreign that he finds a sort of comfort in the sadness, like a small child taking him by the hand it tugs insistently and never let’s him forget he’s anything but miserable.

But it’s okay.

He tries to move on, stupidly, like he’s been dumped and not ripped apart by his own stupid over zealous enthusiasm, but he doesn’t feel anything. It’s worse than the girls he used to fuck, where at least he could break the act down to just getting off, instead he finds himself throwing up in the bar’s sink, the guy long gone by the time Deran's washed all the snot and tears from his face. He calms himself enough to climb the ladder up to his shitty mattress, feels another wave of devastation hit him and he curls up tight as fresh tears build up, _I don’t want this I don’t want this please please I don’t want this._

He must sleep eventually, worn out, head throbbing, he must sleep because he opens his eyes to morning. And he gets up. Washes his face in the sink, gargles some more water to get the taste of death out of his mouth.

His phone chimes.

He’s needed.

The sadness tugs at him and he accepts it, mentally takes it by the hand, let’s it remind him there’s nothing else for him. He breathes in. _once twice three times_. This is the bed he made, whether he meant to or not, whether the choices he made were right or wrong, he can live with this, he can live like this, so long as Adrian's alive, free and not in danger, not stuck in the shit show that has always been Deran's orbit, Deran can learn to live with it.


End file.
